


Nightmares

by Elijahtheepic



Category: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Genre: Gen, Poor Miles, guys he's literally a baby, he has nightmares, he's so small
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-10-13 11:16:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20581616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elijahtheepic/pseuds/Elijahtheepic
Summary: When the nightmares inevitably come, he doesn't wake up screaming.





	Nightmares

He doesn’t wake up screaming. 

It always feels like he should be. It feels like his throat should be as raw and red in the waking world as it feels in his dreams. He should wake up screaming. His parents should come into his room, his dad's gun drawn in case of an intruder, to see if he’s alright. Ganke should spin in his chair, shadows from a screen hiding his worried expression in their dark dorm, to see his friend sitting upright on his bed drenched in sweat caused by the adrenaline from a hell that can’t entirely follow him into awareness. 

No, Miles wakes silently every time. Heart pounding, a scream in his chest that dies before it reaches his lips. Ganke asleep below him or his parents unaware a few rooms over. The nightmares wake no one but their victim. Unable to bring himself to return to arms of fear made of memories and fears, Miles dons his suit and swings out his window. He’ll stop a crime or ten and start swinging back once the sun starts to rise. 

This is his new normal. 

Some nights he sees Uncle Aaron. A hand choking him, and then a gunshot. Falling. Seeing his idol, his uncle, dying in an alley as he talks with a bullet in his back. Listening to the deathly rattle of his final breaths. Running through the streets, his uncle chasing, trying to kill him. But Uncle Aaron wasn’t dressed as the Prowler, he’s in his street clothes, and Miles is in his suit. And then there’s another shot and another and the guns echo and he wakes up with tears on his face. 

Some nights it’s of the other spiders. Glitching out of existence. It was his fault. He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to see, to try to get away. But hearing was almost worse. Sometimes he sees Noir, shot or stabbed by some Nazi in an alley but this time he can’t drag himself to help. Sometimes it’s Penni and SP//DER crushed or shot or blown up or some other horrific thing. Sometimes it’s B. An older MJ and a small child no more that 8 crying and begging Miles for answers. Answers Miles doesn’t have. Then other times it’s Ham, just the pig not getting up from hits he’s walked away fine from before. And then there’s Gwen. Gwen taking a bullet for someone, sometimes him, sometimes a shadow. Gwen needing help but help arriving just to late. Gwen, who is only a few months older than Miles getting smacked into a building by some faceless assailant and not walking away. Gwen not getting up. Spider-Man is supposed to get up.

It’s occasionally his parents too. His friends. His allies. The normal non mutants of his life. Sometimes it’s people he couldn’t save. People who were defenseless. Why couldn’t he save them? People grieving over unimaginable loss. Why does he deserve to walk when he is the reason so many are gone? He doesn’t understand. Mr. Parker was so much better at this. 

Why does he get to be Spider-Man when he killed Peter Parker?

And honestly that’s the worst one. All the chaos of that night. Meeting Mr. Parker. The Collider with its earthquakes and surrealism. The first time he ever swung, held aloft only by a strand of web. Being told to run. The Prowler, The Lizard.

Peter Parker.

“I always get up” followed by a coughing. Would he have made it if he had been dragged out? If Miles had done anything but running? Or would they both have been killed? Would Uncle Aaron have killed them both? Would Wilson Fisk?

“You’ll kill us all” words said to the Kingpin. Mr. Parker was wrong on that one, it was just one. Then two. Then almost three. But Fisk only killed two. Meaty hands and a bullet respectively.

Fisk. 

Seeing his giant fists pounding down. Hearing the crack. It’s one thing to hear the words ‘blunt force trauma’, it’s another to actually see it happen. It’s another thing to experience it. To see huge meaty hands, practically the size of a child. To feel the grown man that those hands belong to viciously bring them down with intent to kill. “Get UP Spider-Man!” But he can’t get up. Because Spider-Man died at the kingpins hands. Long live the Spider-Man who could never live up to his predecessor. 

Long live Spider-Man. 

And wasn’t that the crux of it. Miles Morales was not Spider-Man. At least, he didn’t feel like it. He wasn’t a hero. He was a kid. Wrong place wrong time and he got bit by a spider which gave him these freaky powers that he hardly had control of. Even in Mr. Parker's early days, he seemed so much more… prepared wasn’t the right word but together. Mr. Parker at age 16 was way more together than Miles at 13. Miles swung into things and prayed he would get lucky. He only avoided knives and bullets because of sheer luck and the spider sense and he freaked out the whole time. Mr. Parker could make quips, hack things, and fight all at the same time with a calm and clear head.

At the rate things were going Miles was worried Spider-Man wouldn’t live long at all. Not when he felt like any common mugger could take him out with a glance. 

He couldn’t help but think it would be better is someone could teach him, like Mr. Parker promised. Then he felt horrible and selfish. None of the other spiders had anyone to help them at the beginning. They had to suffer through the bite and its aftermath and the death of their family members alone. They didn’t know what to do, they didn’t know what was happening. Miles didn’t have to do that. Miles had a clue as to what was going on, everyone knew Spider-Man’s origin story. Miles had his family (minus Uncle Aaron, but Miles wouldn’t think about that), Miles had Ganke and Mrs. May. Miles had five other spiders for two days. He had so much to be thankful for, but he was asking for more. Spider-Man couldn’t be selfish, Mr. Parker wasn’t. B, and Gwen, and Noir, and Ham, and Peni weren’t

But Miles was losing sleep. He was falling asleep in class, though he was still passing all of them. He saw two people killed brutally in front of him in the span of two days. He was 13. He wanted to be selfish. He wanted to sleep. He wanted one night without nightmares. One night where he didn’t wake up soaked in his own sweat, screams trapped in his throat and visions of corpses branded into his eyelids. 

“Our family doesn’t run from things.” That's what his mom said to him. 

“Spider-Man always gets up.” Noir said that in Mr. Parker’s Spider-lair.

Miles was a Morales, he was Spider-Man too. He was going to keep going. He refused to run, not from the nightmares. He wasn’t going to run from being Spider-Man either. He was going to get up, as many times as it would take, or he was going to die trying.

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up with some kudos and comments. Also let me know if y'all want me to make a second part to this.


End file.
